Cosplay looks even more awesome through iPhone 7 Plus Portrait mode

One of the best parts of the yearly nerd-fest known as New York Comic Con is the amazing character and superhero (or anti-hero) costumes. They’re beautiful, bold and always memorable. You just want to capture them all.

Most attendees are snapping away with their smartphones, while the pros lug around big cameras and, sometimes, even bigger lenses. I want that pro-look too, but didn’t want to carry my “good camera.” So I took Apple’s new iPhone 7 Plus with the iOS 10 Portrait Mode beta instead.

Portrait mode uses the iPhone 7 Plus’s two built-in cameras (wide angle and telephoto) and a bunch of technology to shoot professional looking portraits that crisply capture the subject while gently blurring out the background. The effect can be stunning.

At New York Comic Con 2016 in New York City’s Jacob Javitz Convention Center, the results impressed even the jaded cosplayers, who were surprise by how good their pictures looked.

I did learn a few things along the way. First, I got better results in the brightly lit area outside the actual convention halls (the ceiling is all glass). Second, a convention is a difficult place to capture iPhone 7 Plus Portrait shots. There were thousands of people crossing in front and, especially, behind my shots. The camera often got fooled and would try to focus on the tons of nearby people. Eventually, I found that if I got low and shot up toward my subjects, I cut away a lot of the people clutter.

And because there were so many people and, in the convention hall, so little space to move, I sometimes could not get far enough away from my subjects (roughly five or six feet) to get the Depth Effect to engage.

All that said, I love the way these cosplayers look. Even single one of the following photos was shot with the iPhone 7 Plus and the still-in-beta Portrait mode. Other than cropping them, I have not applied any adjustments or filters.

Image: LANCE ULANOFF/MASHABLE

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Kentucky Fried Hound

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Tardis

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Tokyo Ghoul and Hiden of Naruto

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Robin

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He’s Batman

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Dr. Who’s Girl in the Fireplace

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Ariel

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Deadpool (also known as Teenage Deadpool)

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Nicole McEldowney and Izzy the puppet of Callie Izzy web series

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Ariel and Ursula

Harley Quinn

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Thor McDonald

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Dead Shot

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Wonder Woman and Super Girl

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From Monty Python and the Holy Grail

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Ashley and Jon Greer are Bat Girl and Batman. Greer is holding his son who is named, naturally, Grayson.